Reviews

“[E]motional immediacy and palpable earnestness...are the record’s hearthstones. Lyrically, Siskiyou is a dark, desperate document that, though it has a certain tenderness and warmth about it, deals largely with mortality, doubt, vehemence, and resignation. While its musical means are fairly traditional…they’re played with economy and conviction, and Huebert’s strained vocal delivery imbues each track with a bittersweet magic uniquely his own.”
Tiny Mix Tapes

“[A]n album that is as structured as it is unrestricted, lush but at the same time simplistic. If Modest Mouse and Wilco were to lock themselves up in a house overlooking the crashing waves of the Pacific in the winter, the result might be something like this.”
Short and Sweet NYC

“Huebert and his bandmates…strip these 11 songs down to such austere acoustic guitar/voice/minimal percussion frameworks that they wind up getting maximum mileage from minimal accents. The warm embrace of an accordion, an uplifting horn chart or Flamenco-flavored castanets mix with an occasional upbeat tempo, graceful waltz or comic line to illuminate these miniatures with essential shafts of salving light.”
Blurt Online

Description

Siskiyou is the new group led by former Great Lake Swimmers member Colin Huebert in collaboration with Erik Arnesen (who still plays with the Swimmers). The group is based in Vancouver, Canada where Huebert has recently settled after a stint working on an organic farm following his departure from the Swimmers. This is their eponymous debut album.

Colin sent us a first collection of songs in early 2010 just as the bitterest months of Montreal winter were setting in. Working like glowing embers on us all season long, gaining warmth and radiance with every listen, the humble intimacy and composure of these recordings steadily drew us into the deeper tension between economy and epiphany humming at the core of the tunes. Emotionally direct, marked by an underlying darkness and doubt about relationships (to each other, to the environment, to mortality) without overreaching lyrically or musically, and without overriding the quiet exuberance embedded in every melody – the songs compel.

It was no surprise to learn that Huebert had channeled these songs with immediacy and austerity, recording dozens of tunes at home with only voice and guitar, generally within minutes of their conception, as an exercise in unmediated documentation. From this audio sketchbook, Huebert and Arnesen began building gently ornate arrangements on top of various tunes, recording overdubs in itinerant fashion in hallways, stairwells, bathrooms and parks throughout the Vancouver area. Banjo, piano, accordion and electric guitar play the lead roles in adorning Colin’s initial acoustic guitar sketches. The resulting collection of songs thrums with a scrupulous lo-fi backwoods energy and restraint. The music has been described as perfectly conjuring the lush, crisp yet often chilly landscape of the Pacific Northwest, and we tend to agree.

We are thrilled to present this first set of self-recorded, self-produced songs by Siskiyou – following the release of their debut free digital single (a cover of Simon and Garfunkel’s “El Condor Pasa”) in June 2010.

Packaging notes

Deluxe 180gLP comes in a thick 24pt. paperboard jacket with 10"x10" art print of the Harvey Pratt cover image and 7"x14" fold-out art/credit insert with illustrations by Megan Wittenberg (both printed in Proterra Chalk 100lb. text paper). Package also includes a limited edition 11"x22" 3-colour silksceren poster designed by Wittenberg and printed on felt-finish olive paper in white, brown and metallic gold inks. CD copy included in retail copies of the LP. Orders in our webshop include MP3 download of the album.

Tracklist

1. Funeral Song
2. Everything I Have
3. Hold It In
4. Pull It Away
5. It's All Going To End
6. Useless Anymore
7. This Land
8. Never Ever Ever Ever Again
9. Inside Of The Ocean=
10. We All Fall Down
11. Big Sur
12. Brevity And Insult